MinkFlamingos

Jul 22 The Weekly Peanut, Issue 127

I am so glad to be on the other side of this week. A little worse for wear, but we are out of our house, set up in our temporary condo, and have a new house under contract.

I really don't know what we were thinking, moving the entire house all by ourselves with a toddler in tow in one weekend. No really. I'm ok if I never ever move again. Ever. Oh wait, what's that? I have to do this again in a month? **whimper**

Double-fisting spaghetti

I suppose the only good part of the moving process is not bothering to cook. D, of course, is totally on board with any plan that involves Stefano's spaghetti. We got access to our temporary condo on Friday and got all our immediate needs set up over there so we could crash there in the evenings. It was a relief to see how large the condo was (over 800 square feet), in a beautiful neighborhood, right next to a park, a view of the pool, seriously gorgeous place. And the closet in the master bedroom is larger than most dorm rooms. The furnished condo has a day bed set up in the breakfast nook, so we decided to get D set up out there. The first night was a challenge, D didn't fall asleep out there until close to 10 pm. And a light shone through the window the whole night. Ugh.

Saturday we had a yummy breakfast at Junior's diner (D has jelly packets and scrambled eggs, which is apparently all she needs in this world). We met up with Grandpa Bobo, Aunt Shelley, and cousin Aria at our old house so Shelley could watch the kiddos while Ian's dad helped us haul off and move some larger items. Shelley and the girls played together at the condo for a while...

and we shared a tasty lunch at Mellow Mushroom.

We got a lot done, but we also came to a frightening conclusion: the Pod we'd ordered (and that the website insisted was the right size for packing a 3 bedroom house of our square footage) was not going to be big enough. Even stacking that stuff so tightly we could have been Tetris champs, it wasn't going to be enough. So we found ourselves accumulating large amounts of stuff to donate or trash. We got RUTHLESS with purging. Everything else started getting shoved into corners in the condo (the condo may or may not look like Hoarders in training live there). Saturday night I was determined not to have a repeat of Friday's extended bed drama, so Ian and I made the call to shift Daphne's sleeping area.

Yup, D's bedroom is now the master closet. She has her crib mattress and blankets and pillows. And she loves it. She fell out very quickly, the dogs don't bug her, it's kind of ideal.

Sunday was going to be the real test: a whole day of packing and cleaning with no family to watch the kid. Keeping a 3 year old entertained all day inside a house? SURE, WHAT COULD GO WRONG?!

I'd managed to clear out the master bedroom Saturday, so I set D up in there hoping she'd have the least amount of trouble to get into. I set her up with the IPad and she wowed me with her Netflix App navigation skills. She continued to surprise me with her TV show choices (the Barbie Dreamhouse show? SERIOUSLY?!). D had fascinating reactions to watching the house get cleared out. The master bedroom she spun in circles and declared "lovely!" But she came and found me later that day and said very seriously, "Mommy, where my room? My room gone." I took her back to her empty bedroom and showed her the decals, "This is your room kiddo, we just took all your stuff out." She looked so... insulted. How dare we move her stuff??

We took a break midday so I could grab us some food from Ian's favorite little Mexican place, Los Dos Amigos. Daphne loves the beans and rice. And running laps through the dining room.

Sunday was so brutal. We'd managed to get everything cleaned out of the bedrooms and bathrooms and most of the kitchen, but the living and dining rooms were still chock full o'stuff, the pod was almost full, and the garage was overflowing with garbage bags and broken down pieces of old furniture. Ugh. But D? D was a champ. No whining. Just the occasional request for food or a snack or help with the IPad. We worked from around 9am until after 6pm and she was patient and sweet and amazing. So we rewarded ourselves for a hard day's work with a trip to Cask & Larder. Happy hour. We got cocktails in little metal barrels with handles. And they made D scrambled eggs for dinner. So good.

eggs are DONE, dude

And D got her reward in the form of a trip to Menchie's on the way home. She chooses the most boring yogurt flavor (chocolate/vanilla swirl) but gets really creative with the toppings (pink and yellow juice filled boba, M&M's, and at least a few other things I can't even remember).

Grandpa Bobo, bless him, offered to come back Monday to help us haul junk to the dump. Thank goodness, or we never would have finished (especially since I had to work, too). We didn't finish until the sun was nearly down, but D was a huge help for the final portion: sweeping the garage (MOMMY! DADY! SWEEP FASTER!).

There it is, the week of doom. I'm covered in bruises of unknown origin (but somehow I didn't break any nails, go figure). We're adjusting to life in the condo (with ONE bathroom). Hopefully this weekend we can get back to Disney for some family time that doesn't involve dust or boxes or brooms.